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Here’s five pieces of compelling digital content you can learn from.

by Dan Slee

A while ago I had this amazing moment of revelation where all of a sudden the penny dropped.

For years now I’ve been reading, looking at and watching good content but what were the ingredients that made them work.

With a piece of paper I scribbled out the things that made them fly.

For me, they boiled down into any of these five things. If they make you feel at least one they work. If you feel more that’s all well and good. They are oooh!, aah! OMG! ha! and lastly, I didn’t know that.

Here is some content for you that has those ingredients. My main focus is public s ector communications but there’s also a couple of others that I think we can all learn from.

oooh!

YouTuber JeffHK published this amazing 10-minute film of 30 days of travel around the globe on a ship shot as timelapse. It’s amazing. There’s no talking. There’s no narrative. There’s no plot. It’s just spectacle and it’s brilliant. The shots of the night sky make me want to head to sea right now.

 

 What this can teach you: Arresting content to get people’s attention can be fine.  

What you can learn from it: Sometimes content that just is beautiful and engaging is fine. It’ll build an audience for your calls to action.

Aaah!

The Dodo is an online media company that produces animal-focussed content. If the internet is little more than cute cats then The Dodo aims to monetise that. That’s fine. This film of a lamb with a soft toy just goes for the ‘aaah!’ factor. Often, when I’m training people in the public sector often mention the working farm that’s owned by their council. If you have the good fortune to have one make the most of it. You have content people want to engage with. 

What you can learn from it: Cute is fine. People come for the ‘aaah!’ and they may stick around for your other messages.

omg!

Hampshire Fire and Rescue used dodgy moustaches to capture attention to tell people about what they do to combat arson. I love it.

What you can learn: Having fan can make a dry subject engaging with people.

ha!

Museums can be such dry places which is a shame when they are filled with such amazing stories. A Twitter spat that wasn’t really a spat hit the headlines as two museum Twitter accounts boasted about the amazing things they each had. It’s great. Human. Engaging. Fun as this account shows.. 

 

What you can learn: Even museums can be human so what is your excuse?

I didn’t know that

There’s one council in the North East of England who are taking video and are really making it fly. If you are interested in seeing how video can be used for comms then take a look at their Facebook stream.

This live video shot after the Great North Run is brilliant. Informal. Informative and it takes you on a behind-the-scenes-tour of the post-race clean-up operation. Better still an idea on how to better recycle emerged from the comments that the council acknowledged.

 

What you can learn: People love behind-the-scenes insights.

Dan Slee is co-founder of comms2point0.

Original source – comms2point0 free online resource for creative comms people – comms2point0

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